This study presents an analytical method which combines the superposition technique along with the solution structure theorem such that a closed-form solution of the hyperbolic heat conduction (HHC) equation can be obtained using fundamental mathematics. The method is applied to investigate two one-dimensional HHC problems with different boundary and initial conditions to study the effect of spatially-decaying and time-varying laser incidence at the surface. The methodology provides a convenient, accurate, and efficient solution to the HHC equation, which is applicable to a variety of HHC analyses for various engineering applications. The examples presented in this study can be used as benchmark problems for future numerical method validations. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.